Thursday, September 15, 2011

Off to New Zealand on The Great Crusade


I am excited to tell you that I am off to New Zealand at the invitation of Qantas on a Qantas Australian Wallabies supporters tour called The Great Crusade. New Zealand is hosting the four-yearly Rugby World Cup, the biggest sports event in the world in 2011.

I will be travelling in a convoy of 20+ luxury campervans (what is a collection of campervans actually called? convoy?caravan? swarm? pandemonium? confusion?) for two weeks from late September soaking in the best of New Zealand while cheering on the Wallabies in their endeavour to win the World Championship trophy.

Most of the convoy won their journey with clever and entertaining videos showing their support for the Wallabies. Check out The Great Crusade website for the winning entries and also the ongoing saga of fictional Toby Withers. Daily episodes, directed by Gregor Jordan (director of feature films such as Two Hands) will be filmed from The Great Crusade around Toby's quest to understand rugby and experience New Zealand (all shown on the website).

Flying with Qantas to Wellington and with a chance to experience both islands, there is lots of quintessential Kiwi entertainment in store including quad biking, bungy jumping, wine tasting in the Marlborough region, whale watching in Kaikoura, the travel wonders of Wellington, the natural beauty of New Zealand along with many other highlights. I will blog about these and add tweets using the hashtag #greatcrusade in the coming weeks as the tour unfolds.

I am really looking forward to exploring New Zealand in convoy with a bunch of enthusiastic folks all while supporting the Australian Wallabies.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Spent three weeks in a camper an there last year.. Awesome country with awesome people..

Mark H said...

@anonymous: Of the avrious forms of travel I've done, I've never travelled in a campervan. I look forward to it so much.

Barbara Weibel said...

Sounds like so much fun! I (foolishly) gave myself only 2 weeks in New Zealand in 2007 and there was so much more of the country I would have liked to see. Looking forward to reading about the places you discover.

Mark H said...

@barbara: I'm really excited at the chance. Travelling by convoy will be interesting - should make for lots of unique opportunities. I love the natural beauty of NZ - an enchanting and magical country.

Sherry said...

The convoy will be fun! Hopefully better roads than I had on my road trip! :) What a great opportunity - I look forward to following along!

Nisha said...

Aww, I so much want to go on a campervan in new Zealand. I was there only for 10 days and the country offers so much more to see, especially countryside.

It has a beautiful countryside and in a campervan would only double the pleasure. Looking forward to your stories and photos.

Any possibility of me getting a chance there? ;)

Mark H said...

@sherry: I'm sure the roads will be much better than Mongolia - geez, I'm not sure they even qualify as roads.

@nisha: I'm really looking forward to this too. I've never travelled via campervan. I've been to NZ a few times and is a favourite country for its wonderful natural beauty and laid-back friendly folks (when their not playing rugby against Australia!!)

Heather on her travels said...

My sons would be really jealous of you - being mad rugby fans - I can pass on the rugby but I wouldn't mind a bit of adventure in New Zealand myself

Mark H said...

@heather: I am so looking forward to it though Australia had a loss last night against Ireland which cruels their chances of winning the World Cup.

Villas Maurice said...

this ia very nice place, New Zealand has always been one of the wonderful place

Henry Williams said...

this is a nice place to visit that first photo is beautiful

Mark H said...

@henry: Thank you. The photo was taken last year in winter is of the elegant conical (and volcanic) Mt Ngauruhoe.

Deep India said...

Firstly New Zealand is an exquisite place and above all adeventurous sport event, great fun you are gonna have. Enjoy and keep doing good work
!!

Mark H said...

@deep india: Only a week away now...

 
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